A familiar bird with an unfamiliar beak: Beak deformities in Buteo jamaicensis (Red-tailed Hawk) may be a signal of an emerging disease
Biologists with the former Falcon Research Group had been studying these charismatic birds since the mid-1980s in the state of Washington, but it wasn’t until the winter of 1996–1997 that they first captured an unusual B. jamaicensis with a strange, elongated beak.